1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to driver circuits that drive word lines of memories.
2. Description of the Related Art
Until recently, a major task in the design of row decoders and their word line drivers was a fast word line activation. But new dynamic and leakage power requirements call for an optimisation of word line drivers in regard to these new constraints. In conventional row decoders, the word line deactivation occurs late compared to the ending of a read or a write operation. As a result, a lot of power is wasted because of the long time duration the memory cells are opened.
More recent techniques are able to minimize the word line driver gate leakage current with an automatic suppression device, but they require a local DC level controller, which increases area, adds leakage currents and is not flexible for tuning.